Sigma Labs Inc. of Santa Fe has reached an agreement to help one of the world’s leading 3-D printing manufacturers develop a way to monitor the quality of parts as they are being made.

Sigma signed an agreement with Morris Technologies Inc. of Cincinnati to pursue a joint venture to commercialize Sigma’s PrintRite3D technology, Sigma President Mark Cola said in a telephone interview.

“Our next step with Morris is to sit down and negotiate an arrangement or venture where we commercialize our technology and move the whole [3-D printing] industry forward,” Cola said.

3-D printing uses lasers to make complex parts, layer by layer, out of metal and plastic powders. Most of the industry is focused on plastic parts, but the aerospace industry needs 3-D manufacturing for metal parts, Cola explained.

The industry, though, has no way of monitoring the quality of those parts as they are being built, he added.

Sigma’s technology, which consists of sensors and software, would monitor a part’s quality layer by layer as it is being built, Cola said.

“It takes many thousands of layers of metal powder melted [by lasers] and fused together to make a part,” Cola said. “Every time you melt and fuse a powder, you have the chance of running a defect. Our technology monitors the quality as a part is being fabricated.

“We give a complete picture of the part as it is being made, as opposed to after the fact.”